With the near-saturation point of Walking Dead product, you may, like me, be a bit jaded by the mere sound of ‘The Walking Dead’. Oh, it was so much simpler a few years ago when all you had a semi-regular comicbook bearing that title. But the success of Kirkman & Co. is well deserved, and the price of success is spin-offs like a new game. Apparently it is going to be based on the comicbook as opposed to the TV series, so there is some hope that the finished product, if/when it appears, may be pretty good. Find out more here;http://uk.ps3.ign.com/articles/115/1150836p1.html

But really, the main reason for me posting this up was to show off the fantastic art tied into the game by the brilliant Charlie Adlard. Bless you, sir.

It is as if, now that #50 has been and gone, the real business begins. Butcher seems to be preparing for his fate / destiny with the proper preparation and planning that the title of this arc suggests. But he is not the only pro-active player in this increasingly fatalistic drama. Ms Bradley, the fast rising star in Vought, is busy with a doomsday simulation that pits the Seven against the Boys in a to-the-death simulation. The final panels of this issue make uncomfortable reading. Ennis wants you to stare at the facts that the simulation presents, because that confrontation is going to be happening for real (in the comic book sense of ‘real’) at some point soon.

This is Butchers issue, as he plots and schemes to get the Government backing he feared would b lost, and ensures that the Boys remain as an entity for now. Until that showdown with the Seven, at least.

Tightly plotted, full of political powerplays – and you really have to be paying attention there at the back, else you get lost in the thick of all this conspiracy and smoke and mirrors – and Ennis’ typical crude humour, this issue is a great example of why The Boys is one of the top 5 comicbooks of the last few years.

And Hughie is back next issue, as he meets up with the original Boy, Lieutenant-Colonel Greg Mallory, and there is a story involving the first supes in WWII. Hurrah!!